


The Dust Building Up At Our Feet

by yuletide_archivist



Category: Stick It (2006)
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2006-12-16
Updated: 2006-12-16
Packaged: 2018-01-25 05:34:44
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,154
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1634231
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/yuletide_archivist/pseuds/yuletide_archivist
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The college numbers on her pinup board grow, but Hayley's in no hurry.</p>
            </blockquote>





	The Dust Building Up At Our Feet

**Author's Note:**

> With thanks to Fox1013
> 
> Written for ImaginaryAlice

 

 

Her window open, Hayley stretches the kink in her leg and considers the cards on her pinup board. The numbers grow, but she's in no hurry, and falls backwards onto her bed.

"You should call them," Mina says, from the door.

"Maybe later," Hayley calls back.

She closes her eyes.

**

She wakes as something bangs beside her head. She sits up. "What the fuck?" she asks aloud, and though her room is empty there is another bang. She turns and stares suspiciously at the wall; listens to the moans she can hear behind it.

"Poot," she hears, and throws her pillow towards the sound.

"I am not listening to this!" she calls; Joanne laughs, and moans again, louder.

A knock sounds at her door; when she pulls it open Poot stands there, naked but for the sheet around his waist. "Please, Hayley," he pleads with her. "Don't ruin this for me."

Hayley throws her hand up in front of her eyes. "That's it," she says. "I'm blind." Poot ducks back into Joanne's room, and after the door slams and the moans start up, she hears echoes coming from across the way and doesn't need to look to see it's coming from Mina's room.

"For fuck's sake," she says to her empty room, and reaches for her pants.

**

She's on the trampoline, and it's late, and the lights are on; he comes looking, of course he does.

"Hayley?" he calls, out of the darkness. "You girls have a fight again." He says it like it's a statement, not a question, and she jumps higher, harder.

"There's too much sex going on over there." She puffs between each bounce; flips and tries not to look down.

"So you thought you'd come kill yourself training?"

"Don't kid yourself," she snaps. "This isn't training, it's flying."

When she looks across at her, he meets her glare, and she falters. "Hayley," he says. Pats the side of the trampoline. "Sit down."

Stubbornly she keeps on bouncing, once and again and again, and when she thinks he's had enough she slows down and rolls, stops beside him.

"What are the haps, Vicki?" she asks, elbow on her knee and chin on her hand.

"Maybe you're too big to live in a dorm house with gymnasts, _Hay_ ," he says; pulls her feet out from under her and pushes his thumb into the ball of her right foot. His hand is cold.

She rolls her eyes. "Ow!" she exclaims; jumps and pulls her foot back. "Can't get rid of me that easily," she says, pushes to the floor. "I'll just glue their springs together." She grins at him as she backs out the door. "Don't forget to turn the lights out!"

She thinks maybe he laughs, and it's enough.

**

She has lunch with her dad. She gets some crappy salad, and he picks the house burger. "What," she says, after half an hour. "You're not ordering me home?"

He smiles at her.

"Hayley," he says. "You're too grown up to live with your old dad."

He takes a huge bite of his burger, and when everything falls out of the other end, he laughs, and she laughs too, and snorts a little.

She knows what he means.

**

"You're too slow," Burt calls from the balcony. She pauses on the horse, feet pointing to the ceiling.

"What?" she asks, and twisting her head to see him, she wobbles but doesn't fall.

"Speed it up!" She hears him clomping down the stairs to yell at her some more, and she finishes it up; executes her turns with a flourish and lands safely on her feet. She lifts her arms to pose, and sketches a bow.

"My coach likes it when I control my tricks," she says, and knows she's being a bitch.

He frowns. "Maybe you control them too well, Hayley."

"I don't know what you're talking about. How is that possible?" Burt comes up beside her; wraps an arm about her shoulders and pulls her close.

"Maybe you've outgrown us, Hay," he says, softly, and she shivers.

"I'm not that old," she replies, and hugs him back.

He lets go first.

**

She runs with Mina.

"So, you and Wei-Wei." She lets her sentence fade into a question.

Mina shrugs. "We're gymnasts," she says. "Who else is going to understand?"

Mina pulls ahead, and Hayley speeds up.

"Yeah, well, I just wish you'd be less noisy!"

Mina laughs.

**

"I got another call for you today," he says.

"Tell them I'll call when I'm ready."

"Hayley," he says, rests a hand on her ankle. When she looks at him, he lets go, and she misses the warmth. "Don't you want more out of gymnastics?"

"I've been to World's," she says. "I don't need anything else."

She lies.

**

Poot and Frank come to visit and try to use the beam. After they fall off three times, they lie on the floor, laughing, and knock heads.

"You guys are such morons," Hayley says, affectionately, and Poot grabs her arm and pulls her down.

"You say the nicest things," he says.

"Hey guys," says Frank. "I think something bad is about to happen."

Poot and Hayley roll to their feet, but they're not quite fast enough, and leave the old building, the stench of Frank in their noses.

Laughing, they search for Joanne, and find Hayley's mother instead.

"Hayley," she says. "Why aren't you returning my calls? We've been very worried about you."

 _We_ doesn't include her father, she knows, and she turns away.

**

"Burt wants us to be mean to you," she hears Wei-Wei say. Hayley looks around and finds her, upside-down on the couch, feet in the air.

"You already are," she says first, and then: "what do you mean?"

"I think he thinks that if we fight, you'll call the colleges. He's trying to use the Force, or something. Joanne says she'll start by banging on the wall more."

"I don't understand," she says, but she does.

**

"Why are you sending me away?" she asks. "I want to stay here." He looks at her. "You're a great coach."

Burt shakes his head. "This year was a first for me. Hayley, and you know it. I was a good gymnast, but I'm a pretty average coach, and you deserve the best. I'm proud of you, and you need to achieve more."

She loops her arm through his. "Not only are you a great coach," she says, "But you are a decent human being, and I really like you."

"Hmm," he says. She knows he means for it to be non-committal, but it comes out a judgement all the same.

"Whatever," she says, and pushes him away. "You suck."

**

She calls the colleges.

She never did like people pushing her.

**

She gets three offers; closes her eyes and picks the one furthest away.

She crumples the card in her hand, and starts packing.

She pushes herself.

END

 

 

 


End file.
